Tag: Chile

These images are screen grabs from the video below of a near-burnover of firefighters near Valparaiso, Chile. The date of this incident is not known, but it may have happened around March 14. There was a report that 19 firefighters were injured on the fire, five of them badly, but this video may not be related to those injuries. Here is how the video was described in the Daily Mail:

This is the terrifying moment firefighters were forced to flee for their lives after becoming surrounded by towering flames when tackling a forest fire in Chile.

The group had been fighting a blaze around the Pacific ports of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar in the west of the country and thought they had almost extinguished the flames.

But due to the hot and windy weather, the blaze suddenly sprung back to life and they were forced to call in reinforcements from the third and seventh companies of firefighters from Vina del Mar.

And with the fire spreading much faster than they anticipated, the footage shows the firefighters running and jumping back on to the fire engine for safety and then speeding away from the blaze.

Luckily they make it and avoid being swept up in the flames but not before quickly returning to the scene, when it was safe to do so, to extinguish the fire.

Fireman Valdes, who was one of those that escaped, said: ‘It was pretty hairy for a while, but once we got free we just got stuck back in again, and continued to tackling the fire.

A mama dog in Chile saved her litter of nine puppies by digging a shelter for them. Witnesses saw the black lab lead the puppies behind a large shipping container and dig a shelter under the container while a large fire burned near them in Valparaiso, Chile. After saving her pups the mother dog, who has been nicknamed “Blackie” by rescue workers, found her own shelter. All of the dogs survived and several Valparaíso residents have stepped forward to adopt the entire family.

Also on Thursday a man in Halstead, Kansas was fatally burned trying to put out a grass fire. After his pants caught on fire while trying to stomp out flames, Fred Rodenberg suffered 4th and 5th degree burns over 50 percent of his body.

In India, Robert Lobo, 58, died Friday after becoming entrapped by a fire while he was cutting trees in the forest in the district of Kasaragod.

In Chile the death of a woman in her 60s who suffered a heart attack was blamed on a large wildfire that required the evacuation of 7,000 people near Valparaiso. Thirty-two people were injured, including 19 firefighters, a spokesperson from the National Emergency Office said. Five of the firefighters were badly injured, but their lives were not in danger.

In northeast Nebraska on Friday an elderly man suffered burns on his legs when he tried to put out a grass fire that started when strong winds blew embers out of a burn barrel. The fire blackened 30 acres near Crofton.